FLAMENCO PERFORMANCE
FRIDA
The premiere of the flamenco performance Frida took place on February 8, 2009 at the
Theater of Estrada named after A. Raikin (St. Petersburg, Russia). Within 10 years the
performance has been shown in St. Petersburg, Moscow, Veliky Novgorod, Lipetsk,
Petrozavodsk, Arkhangelsk, Murmansk, Kirov, Sochi, Baku (Azerbaijan), Brest (Belarus), Limassol (Cyprus), etc. – over a hundred shows in total, and always with a full house.
Frida performed by Natalia Zaikova has been seen by more than 50,000 spectators.
Dozens of enthusiastic reviews from viewers and critics posted on the Internet and in the media
unanimously state that the flamenco play Frida is a unique phenomenon of theatrical art not to
be missed, that the authors and performers managed to create a spectacle that keeps the
audience in tension and admiration from the first till the last minute.
“…How can a dance performance become a high tragedy? The best answer to it was
given by Federico Garcia Lorca in his lecture on duende. Metaphorical, like all poets are, he
called duende – the spirit of dance – a force that "everyone feels, but no philosopher can
explain," that can only be felt, so spontaneous and irrational it is. This duende is invisibly
present in the play Frida, where the vocalist's voice flows like a blood stream, and each
movement starts from the soles of the feet." (M.A. Alyakrinskaya, journalist, associate professor
of journalism and media communications, candidate of Philological Sciences).
The source of inspiration for Frida Natalia Zaykova, the autor and director, found in a
tragic biography of the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, and as a dancer and the main performer she managed to tell the story of this great personality in an absolutely incredible manner by means of flamenco language. The grace and symbolism of every flamenco movement amazingly correlate with Kahlo's paintings, where all the elements are endowed with a certain meaning.
The performance is based on the organic interaction of dance and video projections of Frida's paintings that enhance the impression of the action even further.
The play involves the best flamenco performers in Russia: vocal, guitar and percussion.
Tatyana Shishkova is the only professional flamenco singer in Russia.
Author and director: N. Zaikova
Actors: N. Zaikova, K. Frolov, T. Shishkova, V. Slobodin, A. Parfyonov, S. Konyaev, D. Kirillov